The Discipleship of Discernment

This is the first excerpt of a longer essay that I am writing regarding the spiritual journey of fasting and prayer that God has used to disciple me through a process of discernment over the course of this last year. 

Introduction

And Joshua said to them, « Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder...that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, « What do these stones mean to you? » then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever. » 

Joshua 4:5-7

In the same way that the Israelites brought stones out of the Jordan river and laid them out as a testimony for themselves and future generations, so I look back on the stepping stones of this past year and lay them out as a memorial. 

To help me remember.

Set Your Sails

I’m not sure where the idea originated, except that the first of the year is always a good time to set goals and make resolutions. That’s where the thought was born, I suppose, and it just so happens to be one of the few resolutions that I have actually kept all year. Here I am in the middle of December, looking back at how one year-long discipline  practice has shaped me and changed the trajectory of my life and future.

The year 2019 began with my realization and acceptance of the fact that I would not be returning to Burkina Faso. I had been hanging onto this hope for a long time, but finally loosened my grip and let it go. And I grieved. You can’t move forward well without having grieved well. 

I believed that God had called me to Burkina Faso, and I had promised that I would stay in Burkina Faso until he called me out. When I had to leave unexpectedly due to circumstances beyond my control, I felt unsettled and guilty about my leaving. I count not identify a « call to leave » until a very distinct moment in Greece in the fall of 2018. I had just left Togo by way of Burkina Faso with no plan to return to either country. There on a hotel rooftop overlooking the Aegean Sea, my heart whimpered a prayer, «Here is where I have been, Lord, and now here is where I am. What do you have to say about all this? » 

In that moment, I gazed out to the horizon where the sun was setting, and my attention was grabbed by a few heroic sail boats that I hadn’t noticed before. They drifted, poised, beautiful and adventurous against the golden hues of the setting sun. 

Set your sails, said the Lord. 

And I knew it was him because the thought came from outside of myself, and my eyes brimmed with tears. I knew that this was his word for me, and even though I didn’t know exactly what it meant, my heart was flooded with understanding, peace, and warmth like a hug from the Almighty. I didn’t know where I was going, but I knew he had spoken, and that was all I needed. I was the boat, he was the wind in my sails, and I knew what I had to do in obedience to him: set my sails to catch his wind. 

Looking back, I see that was my call out of Burkina Faso, but it wasn’t really a call out as much as it was a call onward. 

Biblical Fasting

Part of setting my sails was accepting and grieving my parting from Burkina Faso, finishing my time in Togo well, and dreaming about wherever and whatever would be next. The future opened up wide, and I suddenly felt directionless and  terrified by the thought of not knowing what’s next. 

Many times in the Bible when people needed specific guidance about a decision, they fasted and prayed. January 1, 2019, was a Tuesday. So I started the year by fasting and praying, and I committed to fast and pray every Tuesday until I heard from the Lord about where in the world I would serve him next.

I set out with specific questions that I wanted answered. I needed guidance and direction for the journey, and I had a decision to make before the Lord. What is next? Where are you calling me? When do you want me to go and with whom to do what? 

I first studied scripture about fasting and then incorporated the principles I learned. First and foremost, I recognized that the purpose was to spend intentional and lingering time seeking God. Just removing food from the diet doesn’t magically make something spiritual happen. It’s what we do with our hunger. Just as our bodies express hunger and we respond by feeding them, so our spirits also express hunger for God, yet we have ceased to recognize that hunger and respond to it. Fasting from physical food awakens the hunger of the spirit and prompts us to feed our hungry souls with the presence of God. 

I noticed that all biblical fasts are abstentions from food, not television or sugar. Therefore, I always fasted from all food and sometimes included all liquids. I chose to fast for breakfast and lunch and then break the fast with dinner, completing a full 24-hour fast from dinner on Monday night to dinner on Tuesday night. I quickly learned that fasting is a grace-filled practice, not a legalistic one. The point of fasting was to create the space and time to linger in seeking Christ, which sometimes meant starting and ending at different times or even on different days of the week, considering if I was working days or nights, or what other activities were going on. I only missed two Tuesday’s the entire year: once when I participated in a week-long missions intensive that involved a community meal every night, and once when I was on a week long backpacking trip. 

Some days I had the whole day to utilize and I would assign a different prayer topic to each hour of the day. Other days were somewhat busy and I simply prayed during the hours I would usually be eating. Although each Tuesday differed in how I used the time, every Tuesday involved long and lingering time with the Lord, often 1-6 hours, sometimes in a block and sometimes divided throughout the day. The consistent ingredients were always prayer, worship, Scripture meditation, and thinking over the decision in the presence of the Holy Spirit. I mostly did these things privately, but on a few occasions my mother or a close friend participated in prayer walking or worshipping with me. Sometimes my housemates were aware I was fasting, but I mostly tried to keep it unknown. 

It only took about a month to get into a rhythm of fasting every Tuesday, and I began to anticipate it eagerly every week. And every week, God spoke. Every week, I concluded the fast with a distinct awareness of something new - either an insight gained or a revelation of God’s character or a timely Scripture. I felt like a student of Christ every week, which is what a disciple is really. I was a disciple on a decision-making path, and God kept adding treasures to my chest of truths about him and my walk with him. The greatest treasure of all was the nearness to him that I felt. I got comfortable spending long hours with him. When I came to him to seek him and listen to him, he responded in such a tangible, applicable way that I could write it all down. This is a documentation, a narrative, of just that. 

The Better Questions 

People were always asking Jesus questions, and he was really good at giving answers that didn’t actually answer the surface question asked, but rather the deeper issue lying underneath. I started my year long journey of fasting with questions: What is next? Where are you calling me? When do you want me to go and with whom to do what? 

I can say with confidence that God is giving me answers,not to the questions I have been asking, but to better ones. Deeper ones. 

How do I seek God and hear his voice? What does the Word of God have to say about the will of God? When discernment becomes stressful and complicated, what does that reveal about my beliefs about God? How did Christ himself and his followers make decisions? How does God give direction and how do I obey? How can God use me among the nations to fulfill the great commission? Where and how does God want me to witness boldly? 

One week ago on the Tuesday I was fasting, I had such a deep peace within that I felt as though I didn’t even need to fast anymore, that I already had my answer. But it wasn’t the original answer I set out to get; I still don’t know where I’m going as in geographical location, timeline, or details. I still seek those, and so I will continue to fast, but I’m not stressed about them. That’s because the answers I have gained over the course of this past year do indeed answer the questions I was asking as well as the questions I wasn’t asking. I received answers, only to realize that I had been asking the wrong questions. God gave me the answers I needed even though they weren’t answers to the questions I was asking. I think part of the Holy Spirit’s interceding for us is to translate our shallow or off-base questions into ones that will actually give us the guidance that will direct our steps. So getting the right answers from God also taught me how to ask the better questions. 

I have answers now that I didn’t even know how to ask the right questions to get. I reflected on all the things God has taught me, and I sensed the call to write it down. To record the journey. In fact, the same still, small, compelling voice that promoted me to write about my eating disorder is now prompting me to write this. When people ask me if I’ll ever write another book, I say, « Only if the Lord asks me to. » Believe it or not, I don’t aspire to write or be read. But I do fear forgetting. And because I have a feeling that I will come to this crossroads of discernment and decision-making again, I want to remember what God taught me. And I want to record how this decision unfolded. How it grew up in the garden that started with a dying seed. 

Dead, Buried Seed

« Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. » John 12:24

Almost seventeen years ago, my life was buried like a seed when I was born again. Five years ago, my life was buried all over again when I moved to full time cross-cultural missions. And just this year, a seed that I had hidden in the palm of my hand was released and relinquished to the tomb of the soil, and I buried my plans for the future. In the darkness and the stillness, when you cannot see and you feel like you are dying, resurrection is breaking forth. A miracle is budding, blossoming, blooming, and breathing. God is breaking new ground. Something new is being born. New life is unfolding by bursting out of a dying, buried seed. 

I have been discipled by Christ this year during the discernment process. He has taught me that the decision is rarely the point. Discipleship is. It’s about listening to him, hearing from him, seeking and pursuing him, drawing close to him, loving him, and obeying him. In short, it’s all about relationship with him. 

Which, for me, has led to the pursuit and mission of his fame and glory among all nations.